James Tien：Chinese mainland wine bidders buying in bulk

Hong Kong businessman James Tien has been collecting fine wine for many years. 

He has watched in recent years as the growing interest in wine on the mainland has pushed up prices.

"It's like real estate in Knightsbridge in London, or in Hong Kong on the Peak: the mainland's buying up a lot of things that Hong Kong people used to consume in Hong Kong," he notes.
 
Mr Tien says you can tell the mainland bidders because they are buying in bulk.

Raymond Ting's family made its money in real estate on the mainland. 

Now he is in mergers and acquisitions and he has started collecting wine. The best of it is in a huge fridge next to the desk in his office.

Last year he spent about $13m (£7.95m) on his new hobby. For Raymond, this is a sensible investment too. 

"More and more people are buying wine," he says. "For example, each of the top hotel owners in China, the top restaurant owners in China, they are finding out that simple decoration is not going to show they're the top. They have to have a wine cellar."

He points out that mainland China, unlike Hong Kong, still has a high level of import duty on wine. "If that's ever removed," he says, "prices will be boosted like crazy."